Files picture of Gottfrid Svartholm Varg (C) and Peter Sundin, (R) from The Pirate Bay, an online piracy site meeting the press in Stockholm, Sweden on February 15, 2009, to give their views prior on the eve of their trial. (FREDRIK PERSSON)

Files picture of Gottfrid Svartholm Varg (C) and Peter Sundin, (R) from The Pirate Bay, an online piracy site meeting the press in Stockholm, Sweden on February 15, 2009, to give their views prior on the eve of their trial.(FREDRIK PERSSON)

They're bringing down the skull and crossbones and promising their booty will be clean.

But Pirate Bay's incoming owner is having trouble persuading some people that the peer-to-peer, file-sharing website - notorious for making illicit versions of software, movies and music available free to Internet downloaders around the world - has a viable future.

"It's quite unusual, buying an illegal site. Our system is legal, we just don't want to tell anyone how this works [yet]" Hans Pandeya, chief executive officer of Global Gaming Factory X AB, said in an interview yesterday.

Mr. Pandeya spoke after a Stockholm court order compelled one of Pirate Bay's main Internet service providers to pull the plug on the Swedish-based site for facilitating illegal file sharing.

Also yesterday, Swedish authorities said they are investigating potential irregularities in Global Gaming's stock trading in the days leading up to the June 22 announcement of Pirate Bay's sale for 60 million kronor (about $9-million).

Last April, a Swedish judge convicted Pirate Bay's founders of copyright infringement for operating the site, which indexes songs, movies and TV shows for users to download. The four founders were sentenced to a year in jail and together were ordered to pay $3.6-million (U.S.) in damages to some of the world's largest entertainment companies.

Two months later, Global Gaming, a Swedish Internet café and gaming service, announced it would buy the site and launch "new business models." Although its revenue model hasn't been fully revealed yet, the company says it expects to generate revenue from Pirate Bay for both copyright holders and file sharers.

"It's going to be tricky," Mr. Pandeya said.

Global Gaming says one revenue source could come from Pirate Bay acting as a legitimate clearing house for shared files that are in high demand, reducing congestion elsewhere on the Internet.

Mr. Pandeya floated another idea: Sell information to movie, record and software companies about content uploads and downloads by the site's estimated 20 million users.

"This is a major opportunity for the industry to find out what's in this big black box," he said, referring to the activity on Pirate Bay.

For example, buying data about what is popular in the file-sharing world, and where and when files are being shared, could help a music company target a marketing campaign.

But so far the major content providers don't seem interested in Mr. Pandeya's plans.

"We have nothing to do with the discussions regarding the reported purchase of the site," said Adrian Strain of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which represents record labels worldwide.

Nor is Hollywood interested. "Global Gaming has contacted the Motion Picture Association (MPAA) of America in an attempt to initiate discussions," Elizabeth Kaltman, vice-president of the MPAA, said in an e-mail.

"If Global Gaming is successful in acquiring the Pirate Bay [website] any discussions with them will depend on our having a complete understanding of Global Gaming's operation of the Pirate Bay service and how it intends to prevent that site and service from being used for piracy in the future."

Global Gaming has offered to take down any content at the request of a copyright holder. It also acknowledges that a wholesale rejection by content producers would sink its plans.

Global Gaming plans to take possession of Pirate Bay on Thursday, but the deal may be in limbo because of the halt to Global Gaming's trading.

Mr. Pandeya would not say where the site servers would be located. "We've already set up the system in a place we cannot disclose."

He hopes the emerging technology and business model for Pirate Bay will persuade recalcitrant players to embrace his vision. "We can make it technically 99 per cent of the way; the last 1 per cent, we'll have to trust each other."

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